November 23, 1984

A Farmington real estate development firm has signed an agreement to purchase the former Fabric Fire Hose Company building on Glen Road, which it intends to develop as an office complex. The mill, built before the Civil War, has been vacant since 1977, when Uniroyal Inc sold the hose company’s name and equipment to a North Carolina hose-making firm.

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Both Gov O’Neill, a Democrat, and Senate Republican leader Philip Robertson last week said they favor reducing the state sales tax from 7.5 to 7 percent. The governor wants to make the reduction effective July 1, while the senator suggests the cut be made in January.

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In a straw vote on November 15, members of the Town Planner Study Committee voted 8-2 to recommend the town create a new position for a full-time professional town planner. The committee authorized a three-member subcommittee to prepare a proposed job description for the new position.

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Many Newtowners await the first Saturday in December for that is the day the Newtown Rotary Club has traditionally presented its annual Pancake Day. Many legends have developed around Pancake Day. The first is that the pancakes are made from a secret recipe handed down from Colonial times and entrusted only to the care of Robert P. Stokes, master pancake chef. Then there is the applesauce debate. Rotarians have discovered that Newtowners approve of applesauce with their pancakes not as a substitute for maple syrup, but as a alternative.

 

November 27, 1959

A new dance band was unveiled on the Newtown scene Saturday evening when the “Shirelles” performed to the plaudits of those attending the Student Council Dance at Newtown High School. Organized by Bruce Herring only two months ago, the group has “practiced everywhere we can,” and features Bruce on drums, Tom Kretsch on clarinet, Bob Wilkes with his trumpet, and Ted Harris at the piano.

Part of the northern section of Newtown was without electricity this Monday for about two hours, starting at 1:55 pm when a falling tree brought down primary and secondary distribution lines of the Company on Papoose Hill Road. Workers for the Arute Brothers Construction Company dropped a tree across the wires at almost exactly the same spot as they did on the afternoon of November 9.

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Two gifts of woodland have been made to the Newtown Forest Association in recent days. One gift of eight and one-half acres of woodland in Taunton District has been made by Henry Schnakenberg. The other gift of five acres has been made by Miss Pauline Mulholland in the name of her parents, the late Paul Pierce and Sarah Johnson Pierce.

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If you have noticed any strips of aluminum foil, rather like Christmas tinsel, decorating the city streets or countryside recently, it has most likely been dropped by Air Force planes engaged in radar counter measure exercises. Concentration of these foil strips will set up a sort of counter radar smoke screen which makes trailing of targets more difficult. A spokesman for The Housatonic Public Service Company reports that on Friday morning some of these strips fell across electric wires causing one wire to burn down on West Street, Danbury.

November 23, 1934

Chicken thieves paid a visit to the hen house of M.D. Beers, Tuesday night, and removed 25 of his best laying hens. They also broke into the garage of Mr Johnson near the Sandy Hook ball field and stripped his car of five tires. It is to be hoped the miscreants will be caught and properly punished.

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A large attendance is expected at the November meeting of the Newtown Chamber of Commerce, 8 o’clock, this Thursday evening, at the Parker House, when Robert S. Black of Dunedin, New Zealand, will speak on New Zealand and his extensive travels about the world. The public is invited.

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The surveyors in charge of the work of laying out the new roads that will be built in town from funds furnished by the Federal government, are now completing the preliminary work of staking out the rights of way.

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Frank A. Blackman, James B. Nichols, G. Herbert Beers, Edwin B. Camp, W.B. Stevens of Shelton, Arthur E. Brinton and Henry G. Carlson made a fishing trip on Long Island Sound, returning with a catch of nearly 300 frost fish.

 

November 26, 1909

The donation party given Rev and Mrs O.O. Wright, last week Thursday night, was a very pleasant social affair. A sumptuous harvest supper was served and the rector and wife were enriched with gifts amounting to about $100.

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G.H. Miller, the hustling Danbury truckman, furnished trucks and teams for moving the material for the safes in the Newtown Savings bank from the station to the Bank building. He had horses, trucks, and men in Newtown on the job, November 11 and 12 and on Saturday, the 20th.

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A call on Charles G. Meeker found him progressing well on the large addition he is building on his house. He is his own carpenter and mason. Just now he is building a fire place and chimney. In place of laths and plaster he will put on a patent plaster board. He will add a bath room and other modern conveniences.

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The Town hall was well filled Friday night, at the presentation of Evelyn Gray Whiting’s three act comedy, “Mrs Briggs of the Poultry Yard,” by local society people, who were complimented on all sides for the marked success of the entertainment. The comedy is full of amusing situations and was made the more interesting by the local hits interjected into the lines.